Amtrak

A new Amtrak study says adding a second round-trip between St. Paul and Chicago could prove to be popular. The Minnesota and Wisconsin departments of transportation as well as La Crosse County in Wisconsin asked Amtrak to conduct the study.

The body of an executive at St. Paul’s Ecolab was recovered from the wreckage of Amtrak 188 in Philadelphia Thursday. Bob Gildersleeve is the eighth casualty in the crash which also injured 16 people Tuesday night — eight of whom are in critical condition. All are expected to survive.

The deadly Amtrak derailment near Philadelphia appears to be yet another accident that didn’t have to happen. It could have been avoided if a long-sought safety technology had been installed on its tracks and trains, according to information gathered by accident investigators.

The ice fishing in northeast North Dakota is the best it’s been in two decades, but some anglers can’t make it because trains handling freight and crude from the state’s oil patch are displacing Amtrak passenger service.

A trucker died and several passengers were injured when a semi collided with an Amtrak train in central Minnesota. Donald Ray Hedlund Sr., 57, of Bemidji, failed to stop his tractor-trailer at a railroad crossing near Motley about 2:30 p.m. Friday, the Todd County sheriff’s office said.

Republican Tim Pawlenty was set to propose an economic policy Tuesday that would simplify individual tax rates to just three options and cut taxes on business by more than half as he offered himself as a replacement to Barack Obama in the Democratic president’s hometown.